In October, I had the privilege of being one of the first speakers at a new pilot program begun by the Center for Women here in Charleston, SC. The purpose of the program is to engage both women AND men in learning to lead by managing paradox. As we set forth in the Participant Guide, “Smart Leadership™ is the process of recognizing, balancing, and using conflicting yet complementary attributes to drive cultural change for success in a global economy.”
The problem many leaders face is being focused too often on a single outcome, looking at only half of an equation at any given time: short-term results OR long-term-results; task completion OR relationship outcomes; quality work OR quantity of goods and services. The reality for the modern leader is actually the need to deliver both. The real formula is: short-term results AND long-term-results; task completion AND relationship outcomes; quality or work AND quantity of goods and services. The fundamental nature of using paradox to lead is learning to hear both sides of the equation at the same time, and acting on that information even if it initially appears to be contradictory. As professor, consultant, and author Charles Handy put it so succinctly and beautifully in his book The Age of Paradox (1995), “Paradox does not have to be resolved, only managed.”
Smart leaders need to embrace paradox. As they participate, smart leaders will find the usefulness in engaging with what may initially appear to be contradictory, and be able to create a new middle path. The word paradox assumes an equally weighted set of choices, but that is not necessarily so. Sometimes, the paradox comes from listening to the minority point of view. A smart leader is going to have a team that allows for different perspectives and points of view, and is going to be happy to hear from the minority position on any given topic.
Why does a smart leader do this? Because as Liane Davey explains in You First (2013), it helps leaders with seeing opportunities, spotting threats, leveraging strengths, and mitigating weaknesses that might otherwise have been missed. Here’s what she says about the challenge leaders face: “Diversity of thought slows you down. At least it feels like it slows you down. In reality, without diversity you might rocket through the decision-making process only to grind to a halt during implementation.” Differing perspectives leaders need to include on a team must include those from diverse functions and roles, stakeholders inside and outside the organization, and different “thinking styles” from the big picture to the minutia of execution. It can be truly uncomfortable to listen to alternate points of view at first, but you are ultimately going to serve the greater needs or your organization if you can find a way to listen to the minority voices.
Here’s the thing: it doesn’t matter whether that minority is the number of women to men, white to black, introverts to extroverts, gay to straight. What matters is that the minority gets heard, and that any paradoxes get addressed. Not necessarily resolved, but certainly managed.
So, how do you make room for the other side? You must create the space for them to be heard first. Use your agenda and let folks speak for or against any particular item. If you only hear from one person on the issue, use your power as a leader to appoint a different person in order to get a different voice. Some teams use personality tests that are color-coded to remind themselves to look at the red and the blue, the green and the yellow perspectives.
You can specifically ask members of your team to take particular points of view: How does this challenge look to the relationship-focused client? How does this look to the task-oriented administrator? What will be lost AND what will be gained by changing from a quality to a quantity output? Where is the third way, the middle ground between that takes both paradoxes into account? As a smart leader, it is your job to notice if someone on the team is being stifled or never speaks up, and directly inquire into their position.
Tim Cook, Apple’s current CEO, just came out as gay in a Bloomberg Businessweek essay (published October 30,2104), saying that while he never before has publically acknowledged his sexual orientation, he has “come to realize that my desire for personal privacy has been holding me back from doing something more important.” He quoted civil rights campaigner Martin Luther King, saying: “Life’s most persistent and urgent question is, ‘What are you doing for others?’ ”
He added that “being gay has given me a deeper understanding of what it means to be in a minority and provided a window into the challenges that other people in minority groups face every day,” and finished with the statement that he has been lucky to work for a company that “loves creativity and innovation and knows it can only flourish when you embrace people’s differences.” That is exactly what Smart Leadership™ is all about: interdependent apparently paradoxical situations that require great social sensitivity to manage, thus allowing both the leader and the leader’s organization to thrive in the global economy of the 21st century.
Tags: leadership
